By Jim Dower: If there was ever a fight that will likely end with a disqualification, it’s the upcoming non-title fight between unbeaten Kelly Pavlik (34-0, 30 KOs) and 44 year-old Bernard Hopkins (48-5-1, 32 KOs) on October 18th, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. In his prime, Hopkins, a champion whole held the middleweight title for 10 years, was nearly unbeatable against the mostly limited opposition he faced during that time. That, however, is over with, and he’s been on the serious decline in the past three years, losing three out of his last five fights during that stretch of time.

You could easily make the argument that Hopkins should really have four losses out of his last five fights, because many boxing fans feel that he actually lost to Winky Wright, whom he beat by a 12-round unanimous decision in June 2007. I, too, felt that Wright did enough to get the win based on his better punching in the bout. Whatever Hopkins once was as a fighter, he’s not nearly as good as he used to be, especially with his offensive capabilities.

He used to be able to take the fight to his opponent, staying busy at all times and pounding away at them on the inside and outside with good combinations. Now, however, he mostly throws a punch or two, then holds, and then comes in with his head down and lands an accidental head butt. Once the referee separates him from his opponent, the process begins again, punch, and hold, possibly another accidental head butt.

The head butts aren’t the problem, though they can be a nuisance because it’s one more thing for his opponent to have to worry about, but it’s the clinching that’s the biggest problem. Now that Hopkins no longer has the work rate and endurance to throw as many punches as he did earlier in his career, he’s become quite proficient at slowing down the action by clinching often. This in effect takes away the opportunity for his opponents to respond with many of their own shots, because he’s often styling their offense with the clinching and grabbing that he does after almost every punch.

It worked well against his last opponent Joe Calzaghe, could enough to get a 12-round split decision, and good enough to beat him in the minds of many boxing sports writers. However, there’s a fine line between clinching in a strategic manner and that of a more oppressive style, which is intent on taking away the ability for your opponent to respond with his own shots. As much as Hopkins is now clinching, I think there’s a good possibility that he may end up being either penalized often in a bout with Kelly Pavlik or disqualified completely if he continues to grab Pavlik like he did in the Calzaghe bout.

The referee will need to make a big decision, for the clinching that Hopkins did in his bout with Calzaghe, really took away the fun out of the bout, made it less fair for his opponent because he was often having to deal with the constant clinching which often prevented him from getting off his own punches, and made the fight a total bore to watch. At some point, the referee has to look at the bigger picture, namely the fans, and stop a behavior that is taking away from the sport of boxing. Like in other sports where they either speed of the game, like in baseball, remove illegal pitches like spit balls, or in basketball where they don’t allow you go hold your opponent while he’s attempting to dribble, they need to do the same with boxing.

Clinching is fine, if it’s within reason, but if it’s overused to the point of preventing another fighter from getting his shots off due to the frequency of the clinching, then it needs to be penalized, leading to a disqualification if this continues. I don’t know if a referee would feel comfortable doing this to a fighter as popular as Hopkins, but they need to consider doing this if his clinching interrupts the flow of the fight, and prevents Pavlik from getting his shots off.

The best possible solution for the sport would be to limit a certain amount of clinches in each round, and if a fighter goes above that stated number, then it would lead to him being penalized. Without a rule change, however, it’s important for referees to stay mindful to the fans, who don’t enjoy watching a fighter clinch all night long while trying to prevent his opponent from getting his shots off. Like in MMA, where they try to encourage more stand up fighting rather than the wresting on the ground because MMA fans much prefer when the two fighters are standing and trading, boxing needs to make an effort to do away with clinching.

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